PARIS, Aug 2 — National women’s doubles Pearly Tan-M. Thinaah, who created history by entering the semi finals of the Paris Olympics, conceded to the prowess of world No. 1 Chen Qing Chen-Jia Yi Fan today.
In the semi final at Porte de La Chapelle Arena this morning, Malaysians’ hopes of seeing Pearly-Thinaah advance to the final were crushed when they lost 12-21, 21-18, 15-21 after a 78-minute battle.
However, they still have the chance to create another record by winning the first medal for Malaysia in the event, when they meet either world No. 5 Liu Sheng Shu-Tang Ning of China or Nami Matsuyama-Chiharu Shida of Japan in the bronze medal decider tomorrow.
Qing Chen-Yi Fan, Tokyo Olympic silver medalists, dominated from the start to win the first set over the 2022 Commonwealth Games champions.
Pearly-Thinaah, who are world No. 12, then stepped up their tempo to come from behind to tie the score at 15-15, before recording a 21-18 victory to take the match to the rubber set.
However, Pearly-Thinaah, who continued to give a fierce challenge to Qing Chen-Yi Fan with solid cheers from the audience, had to accept the sad result.
It was Pearly-Thinaah’s second loss to the Chinese pair at the 2024 Olympics, having lost 17-21, 20-22 in the first encounter in Group A on Saturday.
Yesterday, Pearly-Thinaah made history as the country’s first women’s doubles pair to qualify for the Olympic semi finals after eliminating last edition’s bronze medalists Kim So Yeong-Kong Hee Yong of South Korea 21-12, 21-13.
The previous best performance was by Vivian Hoo-Woon Khe Wei who lost to champions Misaki Matsutomo-Ayaka Takahashi in the quarter finals of Rio 2016.
Pearly-Thinaah, who started the group stage campaign with a loss to Qing Chen-Yi Fan, managed to turn their fortunes around with an extraordinary victory over Japan’s Mayu Matsumoto-Wakana Nagahara and Indonesia’s Apriyani Rahayu-Siti Fadia Silva Ramadhanti to survive the “group of death”.
— Bernama
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